1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the operation of hybrid vehicles, and more particularly to a distributed system and method for monitoring and controlling torque in a hybrid electric vehicle.
2. Background Art
Previously, hybrid vehicles included a control unit for controlling a level of torque provided by a motor-generator. An example of such a system is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,510,370. Such control systems focused on making the motion of a hybrid vehicle propelled by the motor-generator as similar as possible to the motion of the hybrid vehicle when propelled by an engine. Moreover, such control systems did not employ a distributed torque monitoring architecture or mitigation strategies to inhibit undesired torque or inhibit vehicle acceleration not requested by the driver.